One current missile design comprises a body that is generally cylindrical about a main axis of navigation and inside which a solid charge rocket motor is placed. It also comprises a set of wings or aerodynamic control surfaces fixed notably to a rear part of the body of the missile. This set of wings, of which there are, for example, four and which are distributed uniformly about the circular perimeter of the body both improves the lift of the missile in flight and allows the missile to be steered about its three axes: pitch, yaw and roll by altering the orientation of wing portions. In order to improve missile performance, particularly their agility at low or medium speed, various devices combined under the heading of TVC (which stands for Thruster Vector Control) are known. Thus, divergent nozzles capable of moving or provided with jet deflectors allow the flight trajectory to be controlled by altering the orientation of the thrust generated in the divergent nozzle of the rocket motor. In order further to improve the steering of a missile, particularly when it is intended for short-range missions, recourse is also had to devices commonly referred to as lateral thrusters. In these devices, one or more lateral thrusts, generated by the combustion of a secondary solid charge, allows the trajectory to be altered about the three axes of navigation, pitch, yaw and roll. Maximum effectiveness of such a device having lateral thrusters is obtained during the acceleration phase of the rocket motor, the effectiveness of the aerodynamic control surfaces still being limited in this acceleration phase. It becomes possible in this phase to steer the missile on trajectories having very small radius of curvature.
The range of the missile is another traditional limitation. In order to increase the range of the missile for a given mass of solid charge, attempts are made for example to reduce the drag or, in other words, to limit the losses generated by aerodynamic turbulence and particularly turbulence in the wake of the missile in flight. Through the shape of the wings, the design of the afterbody or other components of the missile, it is possible to limit these losses and increase the range of the rocket motor.
Thus, for short-range missiles the desire is to achieve better steerability; for long-range missions reductions in the coefficient of drag are expected. The existing dedicated systems do not provide an effective solution to these two problems. The rocket motors therefore have to be typed according to their use. With a view to unifying weapon systems and thus limiting the number and mass of equipment to be carried on board the transport or launch vehicle, it is desirable to have available a system that allows both better steerability for short-range missions, and a reduction in the coefficient of drag for long-range missions.
A solution both to the need for modularity of missions, notably a capability to achieve the desired performance whatever the desired altitude and range, and to the need to adapt the missile to suit the highest number of firing platforms, is therefore sought.